Venus of Shadows (58 page)

Sef's throat moved as he swallowed. She felt a little pity for him, and then it passed. He would learn that she was right and be grateful.

He nodded, silently assenting. The crowd was thinning; he stared at the floor. Galina and Yusef removed the tiny recorders from the walls; Matthew and Boaz walked toward the door, saying their farewells to a few of the worshippers.

"If I were alone with her," Sef said, "I could manage it then. You see, I haven't —"

"You musn't fear. There will be only a few of us. Do you think I would have allowed Eva to approach you if I had any doubt? You mean too much to me for that. You know that, don't you? Out of everyone in my mother's household, you were always the kindest to me."

He lowered his head; his eyes met hers. Those words had moved him — not the words of the Guide but of the girl he had treated as a daughter. For an instant, his gaze was more intense; he was not looking at her as a child now. The light in his eyes faded, but he had already told her what she longed to know.

He wanted her. Perhaps he had all along but had refused to acknowledge it to himself; maybe he had only just realized that he did. A barrier had fallen for a few seconds; now he was turning away, as if already denying what he had felt.

The Spirit had led him here tonight; she hadn't been wrong about that. Kichi had said she would lead Sef to Ishtar. Her heart pounded; her soul warmed with love.

*  *  *

Chimene stood with her three shrouded companions. The other men had given Sef a robe; he stood next to Yusef, his head bowed.

She went to him quickly, knowing that the Spirit guided her now. Her hand touched his lightly; she led him to a mat near the screen, away from the others. Usually she joined with other brothers during the rite's aftermath, when all barriers were gone, but she wanted this night to be theirs alone. This way of celebrating the rite was new to Sef; later, when he had accepted her love, he would be able to reach out to her sisters more easily.

They lay on the mat; his robe fell open. His hands groped awkwardly at her body through her shroud; he seemed uncertain of what to do. Was he imagining Eva? Was he hoping he would find Chimene? His hands slipped under the shroud, searching her.

Men had to appease the Spirit, but some needed more guidance. She had been with others who had shared themselves with only one woman in solitude or who were older and needed to be roused. She lowered her head and spread her shroud over him, careful to keep herself hidden, and felt him stiffen as she gripped him with her hand.

Her lips found him; she circled his shaft with her tongue and felt him move under her. He moved inside her mouth; she caressed his testes gently with one hand as her tongue slid over him.

Ishtar had given him to her. She lifted her head, knelt with her knees on either side of him, and opened herself to his touch before guiding him into her. His back arched; he clutched at her hips. Her inner muscles tightened as she rocked on top of him; she lifted her shroud and let it fall.

Sef let out a cry. His face was distorted by horror; for a moment, she feared he might throw her from him. The screen image of a future Venus illuminated him with its dim greenish light. He twisted under her, and then his arms were around her, pulling her down to him.

"I love you," she whispered, feeling the soft hairs of his chest against her cheek. "I've always loved you, and now you'll love me, too."

The barrier between them was gone; he would appease the Spirit through her. A dart of pleasure stabbed inside her, then blossomed as her cries mingled with his.

Twenty-Five

The airship rose above the peaks of the Freyja Mountains, then hovered a bit before it slowly moved southeast. Turing was now only two small glowing spots on an open plateau surrounded by walls of rock. As the domes disappeared behind the mountains, the image on the screen above the two pilots changed. A rust-colored stagnant mist hung over black barren slopes as yellowish droplets sifted down from above. The screen was showing an image of what people might have seen had there been any light to illuminate this dark landscape.

Dyami rested his head against the back of his seat. The image, there primarily for the diversion of any passengers, did not interest him; the mechanisms that were creating it did. The ship's sensors gathered data about what lay outside, but its lenses alone could not have produced this image. Fractal geometries were the lenses through which this landscape was glimpsed; using the data the ship collected with its sensors, the vessel's computer could calculate exactly what light would have revealed, down to the smallest detail. The image was a model based on the symmetries that underlay the rocks outside, the thicker pockets of mist, the movement of the atmospheric winds high overhead, the position of Venus in relation to the sun. The image was a picture built up from millions of parallel calculations; had the sun been shining down on Venus now, the world would have looked exactly like this. Mathematics could pierce the shadows and illuminate what might otherwise remain hidden.

Mathematical formulas were a tool, a way to find order, view the invisible, plot paths, discern what was possible, and describe chaos and disorder — the points at which a system began to break down or where a small variation might have a great effect on the whole. To Dyami, mathematics reflected a beauty and truth he longed to glimpse more often; his world seemed an imperfect shadow that had fallen away from their light.

He had never spoken such thoughts aloud to Balin, but the Habber clearly viewed the universe in a similar way. Yet he and the other man differed in some respects. To Balin, the technology with which he worked seemed almost incidental and was of interest only when it furthered his speculations. For Dyami, it was almost the reverse; he looked for ways to apply what he glimpsed. Mathematics provided a bridge linking him to Balin, the purest expression of the love Dyami felt, the only way, it seemed, that he would ever be able to express it.

The female pilot took off her band and turned to face him; her copilot continued to monitor the ship's panels. Dyami tried to ignore the sashes around both pilots' waists. "You must be glad to be going home for a while," she said.

"I suppose I am." He was the only passenger on the airship; some of the seats, and the aisle between them, held secured cargo — crates of refined metals used in circuitry and ceramics with a variety of purposes.

"It's odd that you, of all people, wanted to work in Turing. You are the Guide's brother, after all."

Dyami shrugged. "My sister has never offered an opinion about that. The Habbers wanted some of us to work with them there, and surely that makes more sense than leaving Habbers to themselves. It wouldn't serve our purpose to have them in control of Turing."

"Still —" The pilot rested her arms on the back of her seat. "There are dangers in being around Habbers too much, especially for those who lack faith. You can come to believe they're friends, and they can never be that."

"Seems to me we're being of service to Ishtar. True believers don't have to endure constant contact with Habbers or contamination by their thoughts, and you'll have a group of Cytherians who can eventually make use of what those Habbers teach us."

"Even so —" The pilot paused. "I've always wondered why the Guide's own brother didn't choose to join our fellowship. That must cause your sister some sorrow."

"Chimene knows we must all find faith in our own way," Dyami replied. "Her love for our mother isn't lessened because Risa never joined. Don't you say that the Spirit must be embraced willingly and without coercion?"

"Yes, but sometimes one must be guided to make the effort. Some people are like children — they don't always know what's best unless you're a bit firmer with them. The Guide has been patient. I don't question her wisdom, but —" The woman smiled. "You should attend some meetings when you're back in Oberg. You may find that you're ready for enlightenment now, after being among our enemies for some time."

"Perhaps I shall." He lapsed into silence, keeping his eyes focused on the screen above her. At last she turned back and put on her band.

He did not like to think about Chimene. Her beliefs and obsessions were at the center of a system whose branches were distorting his world, threatening it with disorder. She would be a threat to him if he was not careful.

Already, he longed to be back in Turing, where he could pretend for a while that Ishtar could not touch him. No members of Ishtar, except for the few pilots who stayed there temporarily between trips, were inside Turing, and the pilots generally kept to themselves. The two hundred Cytherians there and the fifty Habbers who worked with them met freely, as they could never have done elsewhere. No patrol existed to question them about their actions; no one looked askance at their friendships.

Turing had, in fact, become a kind of school; perhaps the Habbers had intended that all along. Much of their actual work was done by machines and cyberminds; Dyami's work in engineering left him enough time to enjoy discussions with Cytherians and Habbers. No one called such sessions seminars, although that was what they were. Dyami had planned to stay in Turing only for a short while before going to an Island school that had accepted him. Now he felt that he might learn more by remaining where he was.

How long would Ishtar tolerate the situation? That depended on factors he could not control and had no power to engineer. Having the Habbers here served to keep Earth at a distance, but their presence was also an affront to the cult that despised and feared them.

An affront to Ishtar … an offender against the Spirit — he had heard such words several times, whispered not about Habbers alone but about a few settlers as well. He was an offense to Ishtar. He had always known that, even before Teo had discovered his secret.

*  *  *

Dyami had been fourteen, sprawled on his bed with Teo. They had been going over a geology lesson before setting aside their screens to gossip about a few of their schoolmates; Teo often spoke scornfully about how some of the boys had begun to behave in the presence of the girls they knew. He could not recall exactly when they had stopped talking, when he first realized that Teo was looking at him with more intensity. His friend's affectionate grip on his shoulder had suddenly become an embrace.

They groped at each other awkwardly. Teo loosened Dyami's garments and gripped him with his hand before Dyami could protest. Then he was suddenly growing hard, holding the other boy's hand as he shuddered and spent himself. The spasm of pleasure made him reckless; he pressed his mouth hard against Teo's and held him firmly, delighting in his friend's response when the dark-haired boy spurted against his belly.

The fear came then, a terror he had rarely felt. One of the household might have come to his door; he had carelessly revealed what he was to his friend. He could no longer pretend that the urges he felt could be kept hidden.

Teo said, "You
are
like me. I knew you were, I felt it for a while."

Dyami sat up and fastened his pants. "How did you know?" His fear was growing; how had he given himself away?

"Little things. You don't go off with some girl to her house to fool around. You never really look at the other boys in the bathroom at school or join in when a few of them start showing each other how they do it alone. They just think we're shy, but I guessed — you're my friend, so I can guess how you think, and I figured you might be like me. You didn't want to watch them at it because you knew you'd enjoy it too much." Teo leaned back against a pillow. "Don't look so worried — they can't know. They probably think you don't want to do anything like that if it might get back to your sister. She might think it's an offense, even if it's just guys fooling around."

"Does anyone else know about you?"

Teo shook his head. "I'm not stupid. I was pretty sure about you though, and if I'd been wrong, at least you wouldn't have told anybody else — I knew that." He nudged Dyami gently in the ribs. "I kept thinking about you. There must be someplace we can go, where we don't have to worry about anyone seeing us. Or we can always lock our doors and tell our parents we have to concentrate on our lessons." He laughed. "You want to be with me, don't you?"

Dyami nodded, but his fear was still there, threatening to overpower him. He wondered if the pleasure he longed for so much was worth enduring that fear. Teo did not seem afraid; he almost seemed to welcome the danger involved.

"How long have you known?" Teo asked. "I mean about yourself."

"I think I always did. When I was younger, there was this teaching image — I used to daydream about him a little without really knowing why. I'd look at certain men and start wondering about them, and then I'd try to put it out of my mind. Whenever I touched myself, I'd think about a man. It never worked if I thought about a girl." Dyami closed his eyes for a moment. "I kept hoping it would go away. Now I'm pretty sure it won't. Even physicians and Counselors might not be able to do that much for me — it's too complicated. I looked up some research. They'd probably have to play around with my hormonal levels and work on my behavior for years, and even then I might not be that different. Makes more sense to leave it alone — there are places where people don't care, but I guess none of those people decided to come here. Besides, it'd cost too much anyway, and I knew I couldn't tell anyone — I didn't want anybody to know." Dyami bit his lip. "An affront to Ishtar — that's what Chimene would call me if she ever knew. She'd have somebody dragging me to meetings and harping at me about appeasing the Spirit and how Ishtar will love me and forgive me only if I spend my whole life pretending I'm something I'm not."

"You don't feel guilty about it, do you?" Teo asked.

"No." He could not feel guilt at having desires he had not chosen to have; it could not matter to others what he imagined when he was alone, pleasuring himself. Fear was what he felt — fear of discovery, combined with a feeling that to protect himself he could never give in to what others called love, that he might always be lonely. Knowing that Teo shared his desires was a small consolation, but now he would have to fear for his friend as well.